Posted
by
samzenpuson Monday March 17, 2014 @12:27PM
from the nothing-to-see-here dept.

schwit1 writes "The government's own figures from 99 federal agencies covering six years show that halfway through its second term, the administration has made few meaningful improvements in the way it releases records. In category after category — except for reducing numbers of old requests and a slight increase in how often it waived copying fees — the government's efforts to be more open about its activities last year were their worst since President Barack Obama took office."

Perhaps that is what he meant about most transparent administration? You know, kind of like trying to beat the world land speed record.... oh wait thats fast...for single wheeled vehic....oh how about single wheeled electric, multi-passenger vehicles? What No record?....oh we have that so beat!

“This is the most transparent administration in history,” -- Barack Obama, February 2013

He must have been speaking about how obvious their stance with regarding releasing information was.

But to make a counter-point, much as I loathe to do so, it's also possible with all the NSA/Snowden stories that they have faced more requests for documents that are classified than typical. It would be nice to see the chart from TFA displayed as a 100% breakdown rather than a stacked breakdown.

Sorry, but no. It's a system designs problem...except that those in power don't see it as a problem.

The basic problem is that the election process is plurality wins rather than majority wins. This ensures that the winner will be one of no more than two major parties when the system is in a stable or quasi-stable state. Third parties have essentially no chance. This is unlike a majority wins election where you have either multiple rounds of voting, or you condense the multiple rounds via some sort of ran

In one organization, unless someone wins 2/3rds of the vote, they draw straws from among the finalists. It works quite well, achieving what campaign finance reform is intended to achieve, without the free speech issues involved such as potentially making it illegal for a blogger to speak their opinion.

It makes a lot of dog-eat-dog campaigning unnecessary because the candidates aren't fighting tooth and nail for that extra 0.1% of the vote - just put up a pretty good candidate, who can get at least 20%-35%

In organizations where there is not a lot of publicity driven voting with funding from biased sources that should work fairly well, but that doesn't describe the US political system. Even so it should act to moderate the extremism. But note that that system is hardly describable as "plurality wins".

Even so, to me it looks as if the system that you have proposed will act so as to maintain and increase the concentration of wealth and power among those that already have it, and squeeze out those on the edges

You end up with a lot less "publicity driven voting driven by funding from biased sources" when no amount of money can buy win. So long as people contribute $X, enough to get your message out, the person with ten times as much money has little or no advantage - both names go into the hat. Campaign finance has extremely diminishing returns. If, in a given race, it takes $1 million in publicity to get 20% of the voters, two million will get you to 25%. Three million will get 27%. Ten million will get 35%.

I'm not even sure at this point WHY they're moving towards opacity. (Is opacity the opposite of transparency when it comes to government?) He's not going for another term, so it's not like hiding details from the voters is going to get him another term. And he's obviously not going to get in real legal trouble, he'd be pardoned by whoever the next guy was, worst case scenario. He's keeping Bush administration secrets about torture secret. [firstlook.org] He was elected in part because people thought he was an anti-bu

The first part of your post was semi rational. I'm asking what motivation he has for the lying in this specific case. I don't think he's just a pathological liar who lies for fun. There's got to be a motive for the coverup, one I can't understand.

As for the second part, don't engage in such hyperbole. You're only degrading any discussion going on here.

Then I see the kids who are put into the foster care system and see how fucked up they become. Only White babies get a chance at a loving home - and even then - if they have developmental problems, all bets are off (You WILL see them on death row.).

I am troubled.

So full of it more likely. I had a very good friend take a crack baby into her home for foster care and fought in the courts for four years before they would finally release the child to her for adoption. Mother completely abandoned her. Father serving a life sentence for multiple murders. But the state felt they were doing her an injustice allowing a white woman to adopt a black child. That little girl is doing great now and will get a free ride at her mother's college because of employment.

I can relate to what you're saying. However, if by "the ruling class" you mean people in leadership positions - people who have built a successful business, people who have successfully organized large events like the Olympics, etc., you end up attacking anyone who has proven they can do a good job on big things - precisely the people we need to have leading.

Another option takes more work, but gets better results:Identify the bad leaders, the morally corrupt and the incompetent. That would include Bush II,

I look forward to the Slashdot Socialists finding some way of blaming this on Bush, Bush, Busch or bush*.

*H.W., W., Gardens, or that bit of flora near the Rose Garden

dude, the bloom is off the rose. even the socialists have lost their love for obama. I think there are many reasoned arguments that can support obama's policies and actions, but the fanbois have moved on. for me it was the NSA thing.

Pretty much. Obama ran on the platform of 'change.' He isn't bringing it. The only reason his supporters continued to support him last election was because a democrat not advancing their agenda would still be better than a republican openly fighting against it.

While we're on this "fuck the republicrats" sidebar, I'd like to take this opportunity to spam you about WOLF-PAC [wolf-pac.com].

I found out about them here on slashdot, and I've been supporting their efforts ever since.

The idea is to do an end-run around the federal legislature and get a supermajority of state legislators to agree to campaign finance reform. Undo Citizens United and a whole slew of other "money in politics" problems by threatening to get another amendment tacked onto our federal constitution.

In the past, even the threat of such a possibility has caused the federal legislature to act. It's actually not as loony of an idea as it initially sounds. I highly recommend you look into WOLF-PAC, if you haven't already. And yes, they should've picked a less-silly name.

This country needs more critical thinkers involved in the political process. That's a problem because usually critical thinkers know better than to get involved in this shit. However, that may be a luxury that we can't much longer afford.

yup, undo the one SCOTUS decision that actually gives people a chance to "spread the word" in the modern equivalent of of the Founding Fathers printing and spreading pamphlets. Have you even read the Citizens United decision? Do you even get the irony alluded to in the majority opinion about how ridiculous it is for any of the "media" commentators to talk about how the majority opinion was wrong because to do so is to argue that the "media" commentators should not have the right to talk politics? Or are you

Indeed, prior to Citizens United, the "media" commentators really didn't talk politics. Thank god for this court case, otherwise Rachel would still be an NFL commentator and Chris would still be stuck doing human interest stories.

Thank you for the morning chuckle. If you feel that the Citizens United decision makes this country a better place, you must be either very rich or very stupid. In any case, most Americans don't see any irony in wanting to get money out of politics. It's unlikely that most Ameri

He wasn't lying, we all just heard him wrong. He made us hope for change. I'm sure hoping for a change right now. Right now I'm just hoping for a GOOD president next time, liberal or conservative hardly matters. Either Kennedy or Reagan would be a thousand times better than our last few presidents.

No, people voted for him because he was marginally better than the Republican. That doesn't really mean they supported him. "Support" seems to imply some level of enthusiasm. Among many, there was no enthusiasm.

However, there were many who did really support him (enthusiastically). The Obama voters seemed to break into two camps: one camp of disillusioned people angered by his broken promises and continuation of Bush policies, but who voted for him anyway because Romney would likely have been worse in t

Well I don't know about love, but I still think that he's been a pretty good president. Just not everything that I had hoped. Virtually all of the criticism against him hasn't stood up to scrutiny when I've taken the time to actually look into it.

Yup. Didn't vote for Obama because I was against his stated position on the 2nd amendment (the honestly stated position before he began campaigning for POTUS), didn't like that he seemed to be wanting to expand all kinds of social welfare programs, etc.

But, you must be totally correct. I'm white and didn't vote for the black guy only because I'm a racist. Does that make the Democrats in the Democrat leaning district in Utah that voted for the white, male Democrat over the black, female Republican also racis

He took an oath to protect and defend the Consitituion. He's not only failed to do so, but he's actively campaigned against the laws and procedures in regard to it. He's ignored it by circumventing or coopting the co-equal branches. If that's not ipeachable actions I dont know what is.

When the executive is subject to the law, you have a democracy or a republic

When the exectuive is able to write or change the law, you have monarchy and tyranny

I never thought the Democrats would be able to out-evil themselves in Presidents - their guy, Woodrow Wilson, was my previous bet for the absolute worst as he, among other things, segregated the US government by race (that's right, if you were educated by unionized school teachers (Democra

Is anything critical of this administration right wing or are they so wonderful in their totality that they are like pony, butterfly farts? Anytime something is posted that is published you proglocrats look like a bunch shambling, drooling zombies. Wake up, you got snookered, get over it and open your eyes. This guy is the worst president every and you fucks need to own it and fix it...

Unless someone is planning to pull a Kennedy on him, he's got 34 months to go...

Oh please NO! I don't want to get Biden as president with all the sympathy of having to take over under those circumstances. Not on your life.

I'll keep the guy I know over dementia prone Biden who would be wheels off nuts. Obama will be totally emasculated by the end of this year when his party looses the Senate. Let him spend his last two years in office planning for his presidential library. If we are ever going to fix this, he has to stay in office and be marginalized as much as possible.

You really think Obama is going to act like other former presidents and leave DC for Chicago or Hawaii? His ego would never allow for it. He will stay in DC and be a thorn in the side of whoever the next president is (Dem or Rep).

As to Biden....tell me again why Palin was so bad compared to Biden again?

You really think Obama is going to act like other former presidents and leave DC for Chicago or Hawaii? His ego would never allow for it. He will stay in DC and be a thorn in the side of whoever the next president is (Dem or Rep).

Perhaps, but if he looses the Senate, he's going to take two brutal years of signing the veto line over and over or he will have to "play ball" and compromise. I'm hoping his narcissistic mind set won't let him stick around a group of people not singing his praises and doing his bidding and he will run off with his tail between his legs after 24 months of getting hit by the rolled up newspaper over and over.

Of course, he could try to sick around and try and rescue his legacy. I just figure it's less like

Because Palin was a soundbite politician. She had an open distaste for carefully considering all sides of an issue, favoring the use of quick slogans ('Drill Baby Drill') to win over the unthinking. It's always hard to tell a politicians image from reality - behind closed doors she could have been a genius in all things - but the image she carefully projected was of the quick-thinking renegade who didn't have the time to actually read any reports or listen to advisers, but instead promised she could run a country on gut instinct and American luck.

well, not for nothing but she and other republicans (and other democrats) correctly predicted we would be having problems with russia and that they are still a treat to freedom. Obama took cheepshots at her and romney and now look at whats happening, imperialist russia crawling back

Unless you do some research on your own and look at her very real track record of reform in Alaska, then yes she is only a soundbite politician.
It would be more accurate to say she was a working class mother who ran for office and made changes to a state rife with cronyism. Unless you do some research on your own and look at her very real track record of reform in Alaska, then yes she is only a soundbite politician.

She is / was a working class mother who ran for office and made changes to a state

Which politician ISN'T after the soundbite? With the media today, it's ALL about the soundbite, because they refuse to actually spend 5 min explaining what the real positions are. It takes too much time and doesn't sell advertisements.

But I have a few sound bites for you to classify... "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan. Period." "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor." "not even a smidgen of corruption" "What difference does it make" or to include the original article, "the most tr

With the media today, it's ALL about the soundbite, because they refuse to actually spend 5 min explaining what the real positions are.

You make it sound like they spent 5 minutes finding out what the position of the person is, rather than scanning for the R or D of policitcal affiliation in the bio and regurgitating their owned canned stereotypes provided them by their news organization.

I agree he has to stay in office. We need to make absolutely sure he takes the blame for all his fuck-ups.

It would great if the GOP could take the Senate. It would possibly enable them to castrate the Affordable Care Act, and it would be worth it in that sense, but I am not optimistic.

Its just to many seats to pickup. In some ways its better if they don't get the Senate. It will make 2016 election simpler because it will be more possible to blame the DNC/Obama. It might at that time be possible to grab

Don't worry, there's no way the GOP doesn't take the Senate. What probably won't happen is that they won't get the veto-proof majority, but come the end of this year, we'll be looking forward to a GOP House and Senate. There's no way it doesn't happen, even Democrat advisors admit as much.

It is absolutely essential we kill the ACA dead. If we don't, people will start to rely on it, and then, much like Social Security, we'll never be rid of it. I'd much rather put a stake in ACA and lose 2016 (which in unlik

> It is absolutely essential we kill the ACA dead. If we don't, people will start to rely on it, and then, much like Social Security, we'll never be rid of it.

ACA needs time to fail, so that the inevitability of single-payer takes root.Single-payer, that atrocious idea shared by almost all advanced countries, including these evil aging Germans with their balanced budget...

Yeah, because the GOP has proven that once in power, they govern for the benefit of all, compromise with minority positions, and pursue policies that balance the interests of capital and labor.

Oh that's right, they nominate telegenic yes-men who rubber stamp a pre-existing agenda that inflames international tensions and entrenches white, christian, business owners disproportionately into positions of power.

"Whenever anything went wrong it became usual to attribute it to Snowball. If a window was broken or a drain was blocked up, someone was certain to say that Snowball had come in the night and done it, and when the key of the store-shed was lost, the whole farm was convinced that Snowball had thrown it down the well. Curiously enough, they went on believing this even after the mislaid key was found under a sack of meal." -- Animal Farm, by George Orwell

The reason it wasn't obvious is that someone might see them going after their watchers, and also breaching the separation of powers, as a far worse offense than violating the Fourth Amendment, as gutted by the SCOTUS.

At least third parties have stepped up, and I would say are doing a far better job at Government transparency.And who cares about transparency? Great, now I can see in minute detail the human rights abuses, and constitutionally illegal practices of the government on a constant and institutional level. Yay, that totally fixes the problem.

"I come in peace," it said, adding after a long moment of further grinding, "take me to your Lizard."

Ford Prefect, of course, had an explanation for this, as he sat with Arthur and watched the nonstop frenetic news reports on television, none of which had anything to say other than to record that the thing had done this amount of damage which was valued at that amount of billions of pounds and had killed this totally other number of people, and then say it again, because the robot was doing nothing more tha